Skill Approach

Chapter 3

Trail Approach
characteristics (stable) not useful for training and development for leadership Certain people were born with special traits that made them great leaders. Trail are who leaders are (i.e., their innate characteristics)
Personality

Skill Approach
Skills

are what leaders can accomplish. A leader-centered perspective on leadership. An emphasis on skills and abilities that can be learned and developed. The skill approach suggests that knowledge and abilities are needed for effective leadership.

Skill Approach
1955Robert

Katz (Harvard Business Review : Skills of an Effective Administrator) Katzs article appeared at a time when researchers were trying to identify a definitive set of leadership traits. Katzs approach was an attempt to transcend the trait problem by addressing leadership as a set of developable skills.

Three-Skill Approach
Katz

suggested that effective administration (i.e., leadership) depends on three basic personal skills: technical, human, and conceptual skills.

Technical Skill
Technical

skill is knowledge about and proficiency in a specific type of work or activity. It includes competencies in a specialized area, analytical ability, and the ability to use appropriate tools and techniques. Technical skill is most important at lower and middle levels of management and less important in upper management.

Human Skill
People

skills. Human skill is knowledge about and ability to work with people. Human skill allow a leader to assist group members in working cooperatively as a group to achieve common goals.

Conceptual Skill
Conceptual

skills are abilities to work with ideas and concepts. A leader with conceptual skills is comfortable talking about the ideas that shape an organization and the intricacies involved. A leader with conceptual skills works easily with abstractions and hypothetical notions.

Conceptual Skill
Conceptual

skills are central to creating a vision and strategic plan for an organization. Understanding what an organization stands for and where it is or should be going.

Skill Approach
Technical

Skillsdeal with things. Human Skillsdeal with people. Conceptual skillsthe ability to work with ideas.

Skill Approach
It

is important for leaders to have all three skills, but depending on where they are in the management structure, some skills are more important than others.

Skill Model
1990Mumford

and his colleagues (a leaders effectiveness depends on the leaders ability to solve complex organizational problems). Leadership capabilities can be developed through education and experience. The skills approach suggests that many people have the potential for leadership.

Skill Model
Mumfords

groups skill-based model has five components: competencies, individual attributes, leadership outcomes, career experiences, and environmental influence

Skill Model
The

skills approach frames leadership as the capabilities (knowledge and skills) that make effective leadership possible.

Competencies
Problem-Solving

Skills Social Judgment Skills Knowledge

Problem-Solving Skills
skills are a leaders creative ability to solve new and unusual, ill-defined organizational problems. The skills included being able to define significant problems, gather problem information, formulate new understandings about the problem, and generate prototype plans for problem solutions.
Problem-solving

Social Judgment Skills

Socail

judgment skills are similar to Katzs (1955) early work on the role of human skills in management. Social judgment skills are the capacity to understand people and social systems.

Social Judgment Skills

They

enable leaders to work with others to solve problems and to marshal support to implement change within an organization. Social judgment skills are the people skills that are necessary to solve unique organizational problems.

Social Judgment Skills

Perspective

taking Social perceptiveness Behavioral flexibility Social performance

Perspective Taking
Perspective

taking means understanding the attitudes that others have toward a particular problem or solution. Perspective taking means being sensitive to other peoples perspectives and goals being able to understand their point of view on different issues. Social intelligence

Social Perceptiveness
Social

perceptiveness is insight and awareness into how others in the organization function. A leader with social perceptiveness has a keen sense of how employees will respond to any proposed change in the organization.

Social Perceptiveness
What

is important to others? What motivates them? What problems do they face, and how do they react to change?

Behavior Flexibility
Behavioral

flexibility is the capacity to change and adapt ones behavior in light of an understanding of others perspectives in the organization. Being flexible means one is not locked into a singular approach to a problem maintains an openness and willingness to change .

Social Performance
Social

performance includes many related skills that may come under the umbrella of communication (persuasion, mediator, coach).

Social Judgment Skills

Social

judgment skills are about being sensitive to how your ideas fit in with others. Can you understand others and their unique needs and motivations? Are you flexible, and can you adapt your own ideas to others? Can you work with others even when there are resistance and conflict?

Knowledge
Knowledge

directly influences a leaders capacity to define complex organizational problems and to attempt to solve them. Knowledge is the accumulation of information and the mental structures used to organize that information.

Knowledge
Leaders

with knowledge know much about the tasks, people, organization, and all the different ways these elements are related to each other. It is knowledge and expertise that make it possible for people to think about complex system issues and identify possible strategies for appropriate change.

Individual Attributes
General

Cognitive Ability Crystallized Cognitive Ability Motivation

General Cognitive Ability

General

cognitive ability can be thought of as a persons intelligence.

Crystallized Cognitive Ability

Crystallized

cognitive ability is intellectual ability that is learned or acquired over time (this type of intelligence is not diminished as people get older). It is the store of knowledge we get through experience (e.g., problem-solving skill, conceptual ability, and social judgment skills).

Motivation
Three

aspects of motivation (willingness, dominance, and social good) prepare people to become leaders.

Personality
This

attribute reminds us that our personality has an impact on the development of our leadership skills.

Leadership Outcomes
Effective

Problem Solving Performance

Effective Problem Solving

Problem

solving is the keystone in the skills approach. In the model, problem-solving skills, as competencies, lead to effective problem solving as a leadership outcome. Good problem solving involves creating solutions that are logical, effective, and unique and that go beyond given information.

Performance
Performance

outcomes reflect how well the leader has done her or his job. Performance is the degree to which a leader has successfully performed the duties to which he or she has been assigned.

Career Experiences
Career

experience helps leaders to improve their skills and knowledge over time. Leaders can develop their abilities through experience, according to the skill model.

Environmental Influences
Environmental

influences are a part of the skills model but not usually under the control of the leader (e.g., the skill levels of subordinated, high-sped technology).

Skill Model
The

model is characterized as a capability model because it examines the relationship between a leaders knowledge and skills (i.e., capabilities) and the leaders performance. Leadership capabilities can be developed over time through education and experience.

Skill Model
The

skill approach suggests that many people have the potential for leadership. The skill approach frames leadership as the capabilities (knowledge and skills) that make effective leadership possible.

Summary of the Skills Model

At

the heart of the model are three competencies: problem-solving skills, social judgment skills, and knowledge. Through job experience and training, leaders can become better problem solvers and more effective leaders.

Summary of the Skills Model

These

three competencies are the central determinants of effective problem solving and performance, although individual attributes, career experience, and environmental influences all have an impact on leader competencies.

How does the skills approach work?

The

skills approach is primarily descriptive: It describes leadership from a skills perspective. Rather than providing prescriptions for success in leadership , the skills approach provides a structure for understanding the nature of effective leadership.

How does the skills approach work?

The

three-skill approach of Katz suggests that the importance of certain leadership skills varies depending on where leaders are in a management hierarchy.

How does the skills approach work?

Katz:

Lower

levels of managementtechnical and human skills are most important. Middle levels of managementtechnical, human, and conceptual skills. The upper management levelsconceptual and human skills.

How does the skills approach work?

Mumford

and colleagues: 1. The skill model contends that leadership outcomes are the direct result of a leaders competencies in problem-solving skills, social judgment skills, and knowledge.

How does the skills approach work?

Mumford

and colleagues: 2. the model illustrates how individual attributes such as general cognitive ability, crystallized cognitive ability, motivation, and personality influence the leaders competencies.

How does the skills approach work?

Mumford

and colleagues: 3. the model describes how career experiences and environmental influences play a direct or indirect role in leadership performance.

How does the skills approach work?

The

skills approach works by providing a map for how to reach effective leadership in an organization: Leaders need to have problem-solving skills, social judgment skills, and knowledge.

How does the skills approach work?

Workers

can improve their capabilities in these areas through training and experience. Although each leaders personal attributes affect his or her skills, it is the leaders skills themselves that are most important in addressing organizational problems.

Strengths
1.

A leader-centered model that stresses the importance of developing particular leadership skills. To conceptualize and create a structure of the process of leadership around skills.

Strengths
The

early researchhighlighted the importance of skills and value of skills across different management levels. The later work placed learned skills at the center of effective leadership performance at all management levels.

Strengths
2.

To describe leadership in terms of skills makes leadership available to everyone (people can learn or develop). 3. The skills approach provides an expansive view of leadership that incorporates a wide variety of component.

Strengths
4.

the skills approach provides a structure that is very consistent with the curricula of most leadership education programs.

Criticisms
1.

the breadth of the skills approach seems to extend beyond the boundaries of leadership (e.g., motivation, critical thinking, personality, conflict resolution, cognitive and crystallized cognitive ability)more general and less precise in explaining leadership performance.

Criticisms
2.

The skills model is weak in predictive value. The model can be faulted because it does not explain how skills lead to effective leadership performance.

Criticisms
3.

the skills approach can be criticized for claiming not to be a trait model when in fact a major component in the model includes individual attributes, which are traitlike (e.g., cognitive abilities, motivation, and personality variables).

Criticisms
4.

the skills approach may not be suitably or appropriately applied to other contexts of leadership. The skills model was constructed by using a large sample of military personnel and observing their performance in the armed services.

Application
Because

the skills approach is a new theoretical formulation, it has not been widely used in applied leadership settings. The approach provides a way to delineate the skills of the leader, and leaders at all levels in an organization can use it.

Application
This

approach helps us to identify our strengths and weaknesses in regard to these technical, human, and conceptual skills. From a wider perspective, the skills approach may be used in the future as a template for the design of extensive leadership development programs.

Application
This

approach provides the evidence for teaching leaders the important aspects of listening, creative problem solving, conflict resolution skills, and much more.

Summary
The

skills approach is a leader-centered perspective that emphasizes the competences of leaders. Katz: three-skill approach (technical, human, and conceptual).

Summary
Mumford

and his colleagues: skills model of leadershipfive components of effective leader performance (competencies, individual attributes, leadership outcomes, career experiences, and environmental influences).

Summary
Strengths 1.

a leader-centered model (the important of the leaders abilities). 2. it available to everyone (we all can learn to develop and improve).

Summary
Strengths

3.

it provides a map (explain how effective leadership performance can be achieved). 4. it provides a structure for leadership education and development programs.

Summary
Criticisms 1.

the breadth of the model seems to extend beyond the boundaries of leadership. 2. the skill model is weak in predictive value (it does not explain how a persons competencies lead to effective leadership performance).

Summary
Criticisms 3.

the skills model claim not to be a trait approach, but individual traits such as cognitive abilities, motivation, and personality play a large role in the model. 4. the skills model is weak in general application because it was constructed using only data from military personnel.